Catholic World News News Feature

BOTH PARTIES BLAMED FOR BURUNDI ARCHBISHOP'S DEATH September 13, 1996

VATICAN (CWN) -- Today's issue of L'Osservatore Romano carries a long article on the slain Archbishop of Gitega, Burundi. The story pays homage to the life of Archbishop Joachim Ruhuna, and reflects on the international outrage aroused by his murder.

"The barbaric assassination of the Archbishop of Gitega, Joachim Ruhuna, has roused the horror and dismay of the international comunity," the Vatican newspaper said. The article, citing the reactions of other international leaders, concluded that when civil violence is extended to include the killing of religious leaders, life in that country has become intolerably dangerous.

"In Burundi, devastated by a ferocious battle between the rival Hutu and Tutsi tribes, Archbishop Ruhuna was a man of dialogue and reconciliation," L'Osservatore pointed out. Apparently his calls for tolerance were themselves intolerable in the eyes of the ethnic rivals, who have rejected all paths other than violence.

Both Hutus and Tutsis have accused their enemies of killing the archbishop. But L'Osservatore Romano insisted that the question of blame must go beyond the question of settling responsibility for this one killing. The Ruhuna killing, the paper concluded, is "the fruit of the blind violence which is growing in that unhappy African country."